Tag Archives: make

LED Tables


Alex Schlegel‘s Day Table uses a photoresistor located in one corner, and eight ShiftBars (for a total of 24 channels) connected to an Arduino to play back the sunlight that fell on the table during the course of the day.

Macetech built this table to demo their shiftbrite RGB LEDs and a Seeeduino. It’s a 9 x 9 grid, but since each LED has its own controller, the cost quickly climbs.


While not a table, Dave Clausen‘s LED Cylinder is a good resource for discussing how to wire up set of addressable RGB LEDs, along with some good resources to parts and the like.

Recently I’ve been thinking about a LED displays. Originally, I was thinking about a full 640 x 480 display, but after doing the math, that idea quickly shrank to a more manageable 32 x 24 display. While part of me thinks that having one of these tables would be interesting, I can’t help but think that in reality they’d just be ugly and too bright.

I started to think about LED displays because my “coffee table” (It’s actually more an end table.) has a glass top and holes cut out in the back for electrical cables to pass through. What I really want is a multitouch display like either of these two guys are building. However, a multitouch is still pretty hacky and more DIY than I want right now. I like the idea of owning one of these tables, I just don’t want to build it.

Synthetic Plants

I’ve been thinking more about solar plants recently. I like how these projects combine both form and function. I’ve been thinking about what I’d like in one of these, and how one would be made. First, the power being collected by the solar cells needs to go somewhere. It could just feed back into the device, which is exactly what happens with plants, but part of me likes the idea of having the sculpture(?) have a practical use as well. If I want practicality, then USB ports for charging an iPod or a phone that I don’t have would be nice. At least one port, but four would be more than plenty. I’m leaning towards the solar cells charging some li-ion or nicad battery coupled with something like a Minty Boost.

The second feature I’ve been hammering the previous electronic plants I’ve looked at is the movement, specifically heliotropism (i.e. sun tracking). It’s an interesting feature, and it would increase the power to the photovoltaics. I don’t like the idea of the hearing servos move, so that means nitinol wires, which also have the quality of more closely resembling natural motion by simply expanding and contracting. The next question then becomes, what form would the motion would take?

If rigid photovoltaics are used, then panel could be mounted to a universal joint with the two outside corners independently controlled by nitinol. The other idea is to use flexible photovoltaics and hopefully no hinges and joints.

Another interesting idea is to think about deployable structures, which would seem to imply the use of flexible photovoltaics. It’s not exactly the heliotropism I was thinking of, but it would be cool if the “leaves” opened up in the day, tracked the light, and then closed at night.

Doing all of this nitinol might be kind of difficult. Heating nitinol causes it to contract in the 3 – 5 % range, doesn’t seem like much. This also means that for a deployable structure, it needs to collapse when the wires are extended,

Will I actually build this? Probably not, but it is something I’ve been thinking about. Perhaps it would give me an excuse to visit Noisebridge.

Radio Free Berkeley Transmitters

Radio Free Berkeley is selling radio transmitters (Brand new obsolete NTSC tv transmitters are also available.) Ruggedized, and small enough to be concealed, the 40W version can transmit 8 – 10 miles.

With one of these and Yuri Suzuki’s QR codes you could create a pretty cool number station.

Video after the jump.

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The Cult of Done Manifesto

This has been kicking around the tubes for a while, but
Bre Pettis of Make, Thingiverse, and of NYC Resistor fame, along with Kio Stark have written what they call The Cult of Done Manifesto. It’s only 13 lines, but it boils down to the same sage advice that’s been around for years.

  1. Start today.
  2. Build one to throw away.
  3. Nothing is ever finished.
  4. Nothing succeeds like success

Wall of Boxes

Since previous project, I’ve been thinking about creating a new cabinet. Something lots of little drawers. Sort of like either a Chinese pharmacy cabinet or a secretary cabinet.

The problem with secretary cabinets is that they’re not useful as furniture today. They used to be used as the nexus of all bills and correspondence of the house, but now the laptop has replaced this. I kind of like the look of an open secretary, but it’s completely useless due to the specialized nature of the furniture.

I think what I like about the Chinese pharmacy cabinets is that mystery they project. All the drawers look the same, but no matter what ails you, the pharmacist can open up some seemly random drawer and give you a potion to cure you. As a design per se, the cabinets are just more stylish filing cabinets.

I have no idea what I would do with a drawer cabinet, but I think I want one.

After the jump are some cabinets that I’ve been trying to draw inspiration from.

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Solar Batteries

Knut Karlsen designed the above trickle charge some NiMH batteries with a wraparound flexible photovoltaics.

Completely impractical, but the idea of simply laying some depleted batteries out on a table to recharge does appeal to me.

Since the relaunch, almost every post references solar panels. Solar is often billed as a cure-all for our climate and energy needs, but as Knut links to photovoltaics themselves are nonrenewable due to rare elements required for their manufacture.

Media Cabinet

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A couple of years ago, just before I moved to California, I made a cabinet to store my CDs and DVDs. Ironically, I never took it with me.

I grew tired of my CDs and DVDs simply sitting a shelf, and appearing nothing but a big wall of media. I wanted something that could store the CDs behind a door, but not use those individual slots, since they can’t handle double CDs, and keeping CDs in order when new CDs are purchased is just too annoying. This meant I needed shelves, but I didn’t want huge shelves. I solved this problem by creating a series of bins, each of which can hold either 20 standard CD jewel cases, or 8 standard DVD cases. (8 DVD cases are almost exactly the width of a CD case.)

This cabinet has 24 bins, for a total capacity of either 480 CDs or 160 DVDs. The bins are wider than a standard CD jewel case, so that they can store the widest CD case in my collection, Johnny Cash’s Unearthed Box Set. (My other box sets have to sit on top due to their book-like formats.)

Below are the initial plans I made for the cabinet, along with photos of the final project.

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